It's interesting how two, 3-sheets from this great Hitch film not only have come up for auction just a couple months apart, but that both also had the bottom panel totally recreated. In looking at them side by side, it certainly appears that two different people did the bottom 1/3 re-creations:
yes it is an interesting factoid.
but there can be easy explanations for it
frequently the top or bottom 2/3 portion of a three sheet can be used as a 40x60 display and that's why frequently they are designed with all the credits in that portion of the poster. Clearly when one is used in this fashion, the other portion can easily get lost.
many western 3 sheets of the late 30's early 40's are done with a text-only portion so that the other portion can be used alone
Some East Side Kids posters are also done this way
regarding the restorations, it is clear that whomever did the restoration on the one sold in December was a talentless fool while the person who did the one I'm offering was at least an artist who only used the reproduced portion as a guide for him to base his work on.
what restorer you use for such work clearly makes a difference
by the way.. This poster was actually sent here back in August. The consignor and I agreed that the 3 restored 3 sheets he sent could wait until I get the monthly auctions running well and he sent me plenty of material to sell anyway. I could have sold it sooner, but we chose not to.
